back to photography basics

Many, many moons ago, I remember saving my hard earned money to buy one of the very highly acclaimed digital cameras that was the latest rave all around the blacktop.

How I loved my little Canon s50.  To be honest, I really only purchased it so I didn’t have to be in the picture, have I ever mentioned how much I hate having my picture taken?  I’d show up at social events and tease my “photographer” friends with their big clunky cameras and rolls of film.  I’d ask them if they needed a sheet behind them in order to take the picture or to warn me if smoke would come out of the flash because I didn’t want to be surprised.

I’ve told this story many times, how I started out as a retoucher and picked up photography as a hobby.  This was way later, way after I purchased my first canon digital camera.  The more and more I became interested in Photoshop, the more and more I leaned towards photography.

I remember when I signed up for my first photography beginners class back in 2006.  It was required that everyone in the class have either a DSLR or 35mm camera.  Of course, I wasn’t about to fork out the money for a DSLR, so I decided to invest on a Canon Rebel T2 that didn’t set me back much at all.

I think it was the second class when this passion for photography just bloomed inside of me.  I’d skip ahead through the book and just look at the amazing photography and I was blown away that a lot of it was achieved decades ago before photoshop was even created.  I was seeing photography in a new light and it just completely captivated me.

I walked out of my class just looking at everything around me with new eyes.  It was like my eyes were the viewfinder and I just wanted to take picture of everything.  But it was beyond that, it was more like I wanted to show my audience how “I see things.”  Show them beauty in the tiniest details I notice every day around me.  Show the respect and love I feel for the people closest to me and capture their beauty.

After 3 months of this photography class I invested in a DSLR that is like my baby!  The class was just a basic beginners class.  Unfortunately, I never took another class.

So when my friend Benny mentioned I should sign up for this B/W Film photography class he takes all the time, I decided it’s about time I go back to the basics.  It kind of feels like a situation I went through in High School.  I remember during my junior year, I was taking Pre-Calculus, never having taken Algebra before.  I understood all the calculus part and when I’d turn in my work the teacher would tell me to simplify.  I’d ask him what he meant, “Simplify what?”  He told me to do the Algebra.  I remember being confused saying, “But I don’t KNOW algebra!”  Even though I would go in before school started and stayed after school to get tutoring on algebra, I never fully grasped it.

I wasn’t until I took a basics Algebra class in college that I finally had this “aha” moment.  One day in class, the missing link in my brain just appeared and math just made sense to me.

I think this is how it’s going to be with this B/W digital class.  I’ll will literally take the basics, learn how to develop film in the darkroom.  I’ve never developed any film of my own.  The REAL photoshop!!!! Hehe.  Benny was telling me that he’d teach me everything about the darkroom if I teach him photoshop.  Sounds like a deal to me!